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TagBarnara Madeloni

“UMass Boston is under attack!” said Barbara Madeloni, MTA President, at the recent UMB forum on April 18th. For the past two years, UMB students, faculty, and staff have suffered from unrelenting cuts to programs, courses, centers, institutes, and more, not to mention additional challenges like the increased parking fees that will have severe short and long term repercussions for the entire community. All the while, administrators, the Board of Trustees, and others have justified these austerity measures by claiming that they are necessary in order to deal with UMB’s debt. Yet they don’t seem to mind UMass Amherst’s taking on Mt. Ida’s $55 to $70 million debt as part of this deal.

All these concerns and more were voiced at the April 18th meeting at UMB that drew hundreds of attendees. Professional Staff Union President Tom Goodkind warned this was, “an acquisition that…ultimately threatens to bleed us dry.” UMB undergraduate student government president Katie Mitrano observed, “putting another campus in the vicinity of Boston makes it harder for our working-class, majority-minority students to compete for jobs, internships and money in a city that already has dozens of schools competing for them.” And FSU President Marlene Kim said that UMB “will lose programs…faculty and staff, and we will lose the underserved,” a stark reminder that this Mt. Ida deal is part of a larger assault on UMB and its mission (her full statement can be found here).

Mt. Ida students, faculty, and staff have also obviously been hurt. All 280 faculty and staff are being laid off, while students are suddenly being forced to enroll at UMass Dartmouth over 50 miles away from Mt. Ida. Instead of focusing on finishing up major requirements and prepping for final exams, they must acclimate themselves to an entirely new university setting. A group of outraged parents is considering filing a class-action suit. The students at Mount Ida don’t want this deal, and UMass Dartmouth is not equipped to allow all students to complete their majors.

Part of the reason students and their families are scrambling is because this entire deal came as a shock to everyone. Mabbett admitted he was “blindsided” by the news, as were many state senators. In fact, there will be an oversight hearing regarding the pending deal because of the utter lack of transparency – even the Board of Higher Education was surprised – they only heard about this purchase in the media even though they were supposed to have already received notification and paperwork for this transaction.

FSU is working with other UMB unions, organizations, students, and Mt. Ida parents to protest this acquisition at the upcoming Board of Higher Education’s Academic Affairs Committee meeting on Tuesday, April 24, at 9 pm at One Ashburton Place, Conference Room 1 on the 21st floor. Please attend!